FIA to continue F1 start trials as McLaren backs “sensible” changes

Last week McLaren’s team boss Andrea Stella voiced concerns over Formula 1 2026’s laborious start procedure with the new cars.

Stella urged the FIA to consider longer start procedure timings to avoid drivers not being able to spool up their turbos, which now has to be done manually by holding revs for over 10 seconds.

Following discussions at Wednesday morning’s F1 Commission meeting in Bahrain, the FIA trialled a longer start procedure by giving drivers an additional five seconds between lining up and starting the lights sequence, which led to a smooth practice start at the end of Wednesday’s running.

F1’s governing body has since confirmed it will continue the experiment after each half day of running on Thursday and Friday before making a decision on what it will do at the start of the season in Australia.

Mark Temple, McLaren’s technical director for performance, said the team was satisfied by what it felt was a “sensible” practice start on Wednesday.

“There were some concerns that were voiced previously, so this was a kind of a chance to put a number of cars together to go through what we expect the start procedure to actually be,” Temple said.

“Certainly, from what I saw, it all looked pretty normal and pretty sensible. I think that kind of helps allay some of those fears, that when everyone’s ready, everyone knows what they’re doing, and the procedures are followed, I don’t think it’s a big issue.

“I think it’s going to be perfectly reasonable. I’m sure there may be a little bit more fine-tuning, and there’ll be feedback from this one, from the drivers, from the teams, and that will be revisited.”

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